


Crumbling

by fabrega



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Spoilers, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-30
Updated: 2018-04-30
Packaged: 2019-04-29 23:20:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14483436
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fabrega/pseuds/fabrega
Summary: It's not fair, but hell, when has it ever been fair?





	Crumbling

**Author's Note:**

> SPOILERS for Infinity War. YOU'VE BEEN WARNED.
> 
> Thanks so much to Sarah, for the beta & for letting me drop this in her lap with very little warning. ♥

Steve Rogers is no stranger to loss. He's spent most of his life losing. He lost his breath, he lost his mother, he lost fights. He went to war, and he lost Bucky and his own life. He woke up in the future, and he'd lost everything he knew. Even the things he still had in one way, he'd lost in another: Brooklyn, Peggy, his sense of purpose. He found and then lost Bucky. He lost SHIELD, tore it down with his own hands. He found and then lost the Avengers.

But these last few years, things have been different. Sure, he's spent his time on the run from the government, a wanted man who had, on paper, lost everything, but in reality? He hadn't lost the things that mattered. He'd found Bucky again. He had Sam, and Nat, and the ability to stay under the radar, and a clear goddamn conscience. He'd _found Bucky again_ , a fact so mind-blowing that it deserves two entries on his list of good things in his life, the things that mattered--a list of things that's been whittled down so small that Steve can keep them all close, a list of things and people that Steve (and most of the people on it) are strong enough to keep safe. 

He starts sleeping through the night again, doesn't wake up gasping for breath, haunted by the specter of what he's lost and what he stands to lose. It's...strange. It's nice. He thinks that maybe he could get used to it.

Then, Thanos. Steve and the people he cares about and his conscience step up, because the universe is at stake, because who would they be if they didn't? For a moment, it feels like a fight they might win--

And then they don't.

He hears Bucky say his name, the last thing Bucky says before he turns to ash and blows away on the wind. It feels like Steve's insides crumble with him, and the feeling only gets worse as they take stock: Okoye had seen T'Challa turn to dust, Wanda is gone, Vision has a gaping hole in his head where the last Infinity Stone had been, and Sam is missing. (Steve thinks about Sam, dying alone while nobody notices, and he feels like he's going to throw up.) Nat's still here, but as she meets Steve's eyes, they both know that's cold comfort. Thanos had won, and Steve had lost. 

Steve had lost more than he had thought it was possible to lose.

The ones who are left retreat to the palace through the aftermath of the battle. Steve sees the same hollow-eyed look on everyone he passes, sorrow and disbelief and horror, everything he's trying to keep from his own face. These people need strength, and they're going to need it from Steve and people like him. It's not fair, but hell, when has Steve's life ever been fair?

.

They end up at the Avengers facility, him and Rhodey, Nat and Bruce and Thor, because who's going to stop them, and besides, where else can Steve go? Home wasn't a place these last few years, it couldn't be. Home was the people he surrounded himself with, home was knowing that Sam was with him and Bucky was safe. Home was the solid, contented feeling that used to sit up under his ribs. Now, that space is empty--no, not empty, that implies a _lack_ that most certainly isn't the case. The feeling that sits there now is a huge, cavernous grief, too big even for his too-big chest, a _home_ that's been destroyed.

Officially, they're here to regroup, falling back to figure out their next move. They're Earth's mightiest heroes, or what's left of them, and there's no way that a loss like this can be the _end_. In reality, they settle into the facility uneasily, licking their wounds, each of them dealing with their own ghosts alone as best they can. 

For his part, Steve feels like he barely has the strength to move right now. He stays in bed for three days straight, scrolling through twitter on his phone, letting himself sink into the rage and mourning of strangers instead of attempting to face his own. They're calling it _the event_ , making up explanations and reasons for what had happened and why. Some people think it's terrorists, or aliens, or the government. Some people think it's the Rapture. Steve knows the true explanation, but _a monster from space snapped his fingers, because he could, because he wanted to_ makes just as much sense as anyone else's spiritual or scientific guess, and so he keeps on scrolling. He bears witness to the suffering he hadn't been able to prevent. He mourns with them.

It's better than sleeping, which he makes the mistake of trying to do only once. He dreams of Bucky, and Sam, and wakes up gasping, the taste of ash on his lips.

Bruce comes in with tea and toast a couple times a day, a guilty look on his face. Steve understands; Bruce had gotten Nat _back_ , not lost her, and despite the losses she had suffered--Fury is gone, and Hill, and half the Barton clan--she and Bruce have each other, something to cling to in this time of death and doubt.

Once Bruce leaves, Steve tries to eat, but it tastes like the ash he'd dreamed about, and so he lets it all sit until it gets cold.

.

On the fourth day, Steve wakes, his body having finally taken matters into its own hands and shut down overnight in a thankfully dreamless sleep, and he feels _empty_. Where there had been grief, now there's not much of anything, a numbness that he's really not certain if it's better or worse than what he'd had before. It reminds him a little of how he'd felt around the time that SHIELD had collapsed, and to be honest, that thought buoys him. Last time, he'd let it drive him to take apart the world's most powerful intelligence agency, the lack of self-preservation inherent in the feeling letting him do what needs to be done.

And now, there is _much_ that needs to be done.

He goes to find Thor.

In the aftermath of everything, Thor had explained his sudden appearance on the Wakandan battlefield, the circumstances that had led him there, the unbearable losses he'd suffered. Steve had been in no shape to offer condolences, and he hopes that Thor understands--if anyone will understand, he thinks, it'll be Thor.

Thor is in the war room, reviewing on four different screens the footage Shuri had sent of the final battle in Wakanda. She'd pulled from the Wakandan drones above the battle, Thor tells him, and from Bruce's suit and from what was left of Vision's databanks. If there are any clues to be found, they will find them.

"I don't think I want to be dead," Steve tells him, haltingly, each word feeling like it's going to get stuck in his throat, "But I also don't think I'd mind too much if I wasn't alive anymore."

Thor gives him a grim smile. "A man with nothing to lose is a dangerous man indeed, Captain."

Steve pauses, searching for a good way to offer his sympathy, then realizing that there probably isn't one and he should forge ahead regardless. "Thor, I'm sorry about your people--your family."

He watches Thor's jaw tighten, watches Thor's shoulders and chest rise and fall with what looks like a deep, centering breath. A beat too late, Thor says, "And I yours. Dark times indeed, with much suffering, and far too much to mourn."

"I don't know about you, but I can personally think of one son-of-a-bitch who probably hasn't suffered _enough_."

Thor hefts his axe--Stormbreaker, he'd called it?--from the desk where it's sitting and grins. "Wherever this fight goes, I'm with you."

"Me too," Rhodey's voice comes from behind them. Steve has no idea how long he's been standing there, how much of their conversation he'd heard, but it hardly matters. It's probably better if he knows where Steve's head is, where his heart is, what Steve intends to get them all into and how.

"And us," Nat says, and Steve turns to look now. All three of them, Rhodey and Nat and Bruce, are standing in the doorway of the war room. Nat's tucked up against Bruce's side, and Rhodey is smiling, and all three of them look the same kind of broken-but-determined that Steve feels himself.

Rhodey asks, "So what's the plan, Cap?"

.

Steve dreams. He gets off the jet in Wakanda, and Bucky greets him with a hug. When Steve looks down at his chest, it's covered in ash. He touches two fingers to the middle of the star, and they come away black.

"I'm going to save you," Steve tells him. He grips Bucky's hand and doesn't let go.

Bucky gives him a lopsided grin. "What, again?"

"Sounds like a lotta trouble for just one guy," Sam says, making his way into the conversation. He claps a hand on Steve's shoulder, then comes around for a hug as well. When he pulls away, there's a dark grey handprint where Sam had touched him and more ash on his chest. There's nothing on Sam.

Steve takes Sam's hand too, holds onto it tightly. He glances down at his hands, sees that they're coated in ash now. He doesn't let go. 

"I'm going to save both of you." He's not sure who he's trying to convince, them or himself. He hopes it works regardless.

"Oh, _well then_ ," Sam says. He's smiling now too. "I guess that sounds like less trouble. Almost might be worth it."

"It is."

"Don't do anything stupid," Bucky says, looking at him seriously.

Before Steve can respond, Sam laughs. "You know he can't promise that."

Bucky rolls his eyes. "I know, I know. Don't do anything _too_ stupid?"

"Don't do anything we wouldn't do?" Sam suggests.

Steve feels like the hole is opening up in his chest again, like his sorrow might swallow him whole. " _Fuck_ , I miss you guys."

Bucky reaches up with his free hand, touches Steve's cheek and then pulls him close to kiss him. Steve still doesn't let go of his hand. "You'll find us, one way or another."

"You always do," Sam says, and he does the same, grabbing Steve and kissing him too. It's a little bit longer than Bucky's kiss, a little bit deeper, and Bucky's snort finally pulls Steve out of it.

"It's not a competition, Wilson," Bucky says, rolling his eyes.

"Oh, you bet your ass it is," Sam says, and Bucky laughs, a real, deep laugh, a sound Steve hasn't heard in _forever_ , even before--

.

He wakes up alone. 

He suits up. 

They go to undo the apocalypse.


End file.
